The Sanskrit word Mandala means “circle.” It is an archetypal image found in all cultures and can be seen in religious practices and in psychological development. The universality of the circle image is visible in the stained glass windows of cathedrals, in Tibetan Buddhism mandala meditation, in Navaho sand painting, and in a child’s first drawing.

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Mandalas are one of the most fundamental archetypes – often circular charts or patterns that represent some symbolic or metaphysical interpretation of our existence in the universe. They appear in many religions and cultures. Sand mandalas created by Tibetan monks. Medicine wheels and dream catchers. The labyrinth walk.
Jung felt the mandala was an indicator of internal processes and emotional state. He referred to it as a cryptogram concerning the state of the self. The mandala, he believed, represented the wholeness of personality.
Let me repeat that: Wholeness of personality.

In the yoga practices mandala can be a support for meditation or an image that must be internalized through mental absorption. This image organizes the inner energies and forces of the practitioner and puts them in relationship with his ego.
 

Generally speaking a mandala is a geometrical form - a square or a circle - abstract and static, or a vivid image formed of objects and/or beings.

In our dreams the mandala indicates the phenomenon of centering the individual psychic in which the ego reconsiders its (dominant) position through the assimilation of the collective unconscious contents (symbols or archetypal images).

Other mandala images can be circular fountains, parks and their radial alleys, square market places, obelisks, buildings with a circular or square shape, lakes, rivers (radial water networks).